1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a firmware version managing method of a computer system having a plurality of partitions in which a plurality of operation systems can be operated, and an information processing device having a plurality of partitions in which a plurality of operation systems can be operated.
2. Description of the Related Art
With a computer system for basic operations, it is essential to exchange hardware and load new firmware in an active state.
A method for changing the function of a computer system can be two methods, that is, exchanging a system board and loading new firmware of a system board.
The first method of exchanging a system board is to design a new board to necessarily exchange the entire hardware, and require a larger number of steps than the second method of loading new firmware in designing and loading processes. Normally, When a board is exchanged or new firmware is loaded after a computer system is implemented and then modified, loading new firmware requires a shorter processing time.
In a computer system having a plurality of partitions in which a plurality of operating systems can be simultaneously operated, different versions of firmware can be used in the respective partitions. If a different version of firmware is used in each partition, it is necessary that the same version is to be used between the firmware of the replacing system board and the firmware of the partition to be used. Conventionally, in this case, the version of the firmware of each partition is checked by a person who exchanges a system board to use the same version.
Furthermore, when a partition is newly generated and a system board is expanded, it is desired that the firmware to be implemented in the system board is the latest version. However, it is not necessarily the latest version of firmware implemented in the current system board.
Patent Document 1 describes the method of efficiently performing a rewriting operation to update the version of firmware by determining whether or not the existing version and the latest version of the firmware for control of the output of information equipment match each other, updating the version to the latest version when they do not match, and selecting the latest version or the existing version and performing output processing depending on a result of the update.
Patent Document 2 describes the method of loading the optimum replacing firmware in the system configuration of the current peripheral device and the host computer from an automatically specified place when the driver is activated so that the firmware can be optimally updated.                [Patent Document 1] Japanese Published Patent Application No. 2002-358209        [Patent Document 2] Japanese Published Patent Application No. 2004-21463        